


Doors Close But Windows Open

by Devilc



Category: DCU
Genre: Gen, Superpowers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-30
Updated: 2010-01-30
Packaged: 2017-10-06 19:56:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/57212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Devilc/pseuds/Devilc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An alternate take on events from <i>Identity Crisis</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Doors Close But Windows Open

**Author's Note:**

> [So, I'm doing my own damn SILTS here](http://devilc.livejournal.com/31469.html).
> 
> So, what if [this scene had played differently?](http://journal.henkei.com/scans_daily/owen/014_IdentityCrisis_06_02.jpg)
> 
> Oh, and I've always pegged Owen as being 20, or 21, tops.

What really got Owen, as if this wasn't the most fucked up evening of his life, was the absolute self-confident, downright smug, tone of the Suit's voice as he gave that "There's nobody here but us agents" spiel. As if Owen didn't count.

And when the Suit draped his arm over Owen's shoulder and talked about not picking a fight, not here, not now, and was just, "... go home, take some time", Owen thought, _Fuck you, asshole. I've got moves_. He didn't even have to **think** about it, about the **how** of it. Just did it. Just whipped around and jammed that asshole's arm up and behind his back and **slammed** him into the wall. The Suit dropped like a sack of potatoes.

In the split second before any of the agents could react, Owen jumped the blood in the doorway and zipped in to the room. "W-which one was Captain Boomerang?" he asked the man who supposedly wasn't there before that glare dried the spit in his mouth. The door filled with Suits, but they looked at Batman, waiting for their cue.

Batman looked him up and down before saying, "Doorway" in a voice like razory ice. He didn't bother to spare a glance for the agents.

"Oh." Owen said and then it him like a hammer and he staggered to the trashcan in the corner and hurked up what felt like everything he ate the in the past week, and when that was done, the heaves brought up this green slime that's the foulest stuff Owen's ever had in his mouth, and for some reason his mind flashed back to a health class he had two years ago in high school. Mr. Preminger said it was impossible to vomit bile. _Yeah. Right._ Owen spit as much as he could to get the taste out of his mouth, not that it helped much. Finished, he slumped down against the wall, legs like noodles, his stomach lurching every time he looked at both those outlines ... both those lakes of blood, and _oh fuck_ this is real. This isn't a nightmare. He isn't going to wake up. His dad really did do this incredibly stupid, fucked up thing.

His stomach jumped again and he crouched over the basket, heaving so hard that tears streamed out of his eyes, but nothing came up. Then his knees buckled.

He tried to stand and couldn't. _Yeah, I got moves,_ he thought bitterly, unable to bite back the chuckle, because where he is right now, what he's just done, it's as rich as it is stupid. He knocked an agent out. That bought a fellow quite a bit more than an overnighter in jail.

Batman loomed over him, holding out a wad of damp paper towels, and Owen remembered thinking that's kind of weird, because the expression on what he could see of Batman's face was a murderously dirty look, but at the same time he was giving Owen something to wipe the bile aftertaste out of his mouth. "Thanks", Owen murmured. His arm shook from the effort of reaching over to put the paper towels in the trash can. He hadn't felt this weak and shaky since a bad case of the flu kept him in bed for a week a few years back.

"Are you really Captain Boomerang's son?"

"Yes." He tried to shift himself up straighter, standing was completely out of the question, but he just could not make his arm push hard enough against the floor, and Owen started to feel scared, because Batman's clearly got some sort of energy drain thing going on to make him feel this way, and those Suits at the door were just watching.

"I'm going to need to talk to you. Where do you live?"

"2678 Ocean Avenue." Owen said without thinking.

The glare intensified. "There is no Ocean Avenue in Gotham."

"'S not. 'S in Central -- Central City." He's so wiped, his voice has started to go all wobbly.

Hands grabbed his shirt, hauled him upright. The world spun in a sickening lurch.

"_How. Did. You. Get. Here_?!" Batman's gaze rabbited all around, as if he expected somebody to leap out of thin air.

Owen blinked owlishly at that. Because, yeah. How did he get here? "I-I think I ran," he said lamely.

Pause.

Owen's vision drifted from color to black and white as Batman manhandled him over to the kitchen table, kicked a chair back, and plopped him in it.

"I'll take it from here," Batman said to the agents in the doorway, glared at them when they didn't vanish immediately, then opened the refrigerator. He plonked a half-gallon jug of orange juice down in front of Owen. "Drink."

Owen grabbed the handle, but it's just too heavy. "I-I can't." _God, WTF is wrong?!_

Hand in his hair, head yanked back, cold orange juice in his mouth, down his throat, down the front of his shirt, Batman's voice ordered him to keep chugging and Owen half thought he would drown before Batman let him up for air.

But it worked. Less than a minute later, Owen became completely ravenous and chugged down the rest of the jug on his own. Color vision returned, and Batman, the nicest asshole in the world, had just handed him another wad of paper towels so he can sponge the worst of the juice off.

Owen had begun to feel like he could actually stand up by the time Batman whipped out something like a cellphone, hit somebody in his speed dial, and said to the person on the other end of the line, "I could use your help with something. You've got my location. And watch your step, it's a crime scene." Batman had barely closed the phone and put it back on his belt when the Flash entered the room.

"Yeah?"

Batman pointed at Owen. "Does he have super speed?"

And Flash zipped over and put his hands on Owen's head and Owen felt this weird sort of ... reverb ... was the only word he could think to describe it.

"Um, yeah, he _does_. It's kind of strange. There's ... static ... in the connection, though." And the Flash looked at Owen, expression all _WTF?!_

"You see the news?" It seemed Batman's voice was just as cold with his friends as with everybody else.

"I was watching it -- Oh. Oh man, so this is the scene --"

"He's Captain Boomerang's son." Batman cut in.

Flash looked at Owen like he had three heads. "_Oh._"

Batman said, "Apparently he ran here from Central City."

"Did you know you had speed?" Flash asked him nicely, which was kind of strange, considering that Captain Boomerang ~~is~~ **was** his father.

"I-I ... Just for about a week now. And only short bursts. I didn't know I could -- I turned on the TV and heard about my dad ... and I was here." Owen shrugged.

Batman indicated the wastebasket. "He vomited quite a bit when he saw the blood."

Flash gave a sort of sympathetic laugh. "Okay, I get it now. Totally running on empty. Been there, done that --" his mouth got a mischievous quirk, " -- we'll just zip on over to Batman's place and help ourselves to cookies. His personal assistant makes the _best_ chocolate chip pecan -- just kidding, Batman. I saw a diner a few blocks over, I'll take him there and get him stocked up. It would be cool if you could chip in, though."

Batman reached into a pouch on his belt and handed Flash a roll of bills. "I'll still need to talk to him."

"And," Owen took a deep breath, remembering why he's here, "And I still need to see my dad. Make arrangements --"

"Later."

And then The Flash was helping him stand, and as they walked out, Owen can't help but think that this, the shittiest day of his life, was also going to be the day that it took a turn for the extraordinary.


End file.
